What is Social Climbing?

by Brett Borders on September 8, 2009

The social hierarchy of some groups is relatively “flat” and people are mostly treated as equals. But many groups are defined by a palpable “vertical” hierarchy based on clout and social class. In these groups, people spend a huge chunk of their social energy gaining and maintaining personal status.

At the top of the social class pyramid are the uber-elite members with the most highly-desired traits. In the venture capital / startup world, they are the rich investors and people whose companies were acquired by larger companies. In the conference scene, it’s the big name “rockstar” bloggers and speakers who jet around the world – blurring the line between business and partying. Online, it’s the power users with the strongest Twitter / Digg accounts or blog followings – who have the digital influence to launch new content into the heights of popularity.

Because the elite have money to invest in new ideas… or they can to decide who gets to speak at conferences or whose stories make the home page – they literally have the power to define what’s cool in a scene. The elite caste members set the mold that those below them feel great pressure to emulate. The pressure to leave behind those with undesirable traits can be heavy – even if that includes oneself. Change your clothes, get a new haircut, learn the lingo and get seen talking to the right people!

The Principle of Proximity

Social climbing is usually done by the principle of proximity – where the ticket to higher class is frequently associating with people of a higher class than yours. You don’t have to be a rich genius; you just have find a way to be associated with one. You can date one, or even just work as their low-level assistant – an you’ll be treated as a member of a influential servant caste. You don’t have to be a famous blogger, you just have to be seen @replying to them on Twitter all the time. At social media conferences, one can observe people “posing” and clamoring to stand in dense groups near higher-status people… while lower status, less-connected people stand in sparse groups on the periphery.

Dr. Trix argues that members of higher classes usually subject people to a lot of scrutiny before accepting them into their world and they tend to look down the most on the people in the class directly below theirs. The billionaires smirk at the millionaires… and so on down the ladder. As you move down the class ladder towards the bottom, people become more welcoming because they are heavily oppressed by the upper classes. Social climbing gets a bad name because it often involves turning a cold shoulder. Even if some people don’t intentionally oppress others, they spend so much time and energy “climbing” that they rarely have any energy left to smile or chat with someone who can’t help boost their status.

Road Blocking

Social climbers are always reaching up – but they sometimes stamp down on the fingers of others below them. Road blocking is my term for deliberately excluding or sabotaging people – with the (unconscious) intention of maintaining your one’s perch on the social ladder. It’s where social climbing can get pathological and downright nasty.

Road blocks can be a simple as quietly pulling out someone’s speaker application because you’d rather have the limelight to yourself – or as complex as creating a whole suite of false, libelous rumors about someone and spreading them on multiple fronts. Online “bury brigades” gang up and sabotage people’s social media efforts.

Cliques and private companies use unwritten road blocks to keep everyone new out – allowing them to hand filter those with the most desirable traits. Talentless hacks use roadblocks to prevent other people from competing with them, as do best-of-breed champions. Road blocking often done in competitive social scenes, but it’s the shadow side of social climbing that is rarely talked about.

What is your own observations on social climbing? What is the hierarchy of different social classes in our scene — which groups are at the top and bottom?

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http://zudfunck.com/ ZuDfunck

Oh buddy!
You’re gonna hit a nerve with this post!
Well done
Well done indeed!

http://jeffhurtblog.com Anonymous

Ouch! That hit a tender spot for me. And, it’s so true.

I’m currently completing a fourth year on a charity fundraising board and a sixth year as their volunteer. I’ve watched this organization cycle through people faster than the fashion trends. I’ve also seen their culture and leadership transition from a top-down hierarchy total control to empowerment of others back to top-down clamped-down control that you can’t even send an email to all the board members unless it goes through the co-chairs. Unless you have lots of money, own your own company and can take a year off, you don’t move up in the pack as a board member to an elected leadership role. It’s sad indeed and I’m rolling off this board this year discouraged that people lost sight of raising money for charity and instead have created a clique social class.

I just hope I’ve never road blocked anyone and instead have always been willing to help others transition to better roles.

http://topsy.com/tb/bit.ly/7ecxz Tweets that mention What is Social Climbing? — Topsy.com

[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Brett Borders, Brett Borders, Ching Ya, Ross Miles and others. Brett Borders said: @disqus HELP! Blog comments are not working on new post. This page could not be reached by Disqus. http://bit.ly/7ecxz [...]

I wasn’t at SxSW last year and to be frank, I’m glad I wasn’t. One of the overbearing things that came out of there from people whose opinion I truly trust is that there was a lot of SM love-ups between many of the “names”.

Going back and looking at the Twitter stream just enforced this view. People dropping names like flies in a dung pile (“Looking forward to hanging with”, “Come to restaurant X. Why? Look who’s there”, and more like it. Who cares? Seriously. If you have to offer faux backslapping to show you “belong” then you don’t really belong. And to be fair, would you really want to anyway if it’s all about the names?

Give me real, honest to God people with no agenda that aren’t trying to be something they’re not anyday. They’re the real cool people; the others are just trying to break into the fridge.

http://socialmediarockstar.com Brett Borders

Naomi,

I love the phrase, too – but the people it describes can be a drag. There’s a huge scene of them on the West Coast of North America… preening, parading and thumbing their nose at people who aren’t as fashionable them. Here’s a pic:

I like real people, too. Real cool people who don’t have to prove it. I used to live in Oregon and it was filled with nice, real people who weren’t into money and status and business. People who asked “How are you?” and really wanted to know, rather than “Who are you here with.. and what can you possibly do for me?”

I’ve never been to SXSW yet. The people who I’ve met who really, really, really seem to rabidly worship it are name dropper / social climber types – so it sets off a red flag. Also I’m not into indie rock, and I think that’s a big component of the music lineup + style ideal there.

I want to go to more social media conferences and I’m not “too cool for SXSW” – but I guess I am looking for something with a slightly smaller, more intimate vibe.

http://socialmediarockstar.com Brett Borders

Jeff,

I can only imagine the politics on a fund raising or advisory board. That is ripe, fertile ground for creating an exclusive status clique- the perfect vessel for politics and pride swelling to take precedence over the intended charity function. It sounds like a classic vertical hierarchy when non-rich people are roadblocked from leadership.

I hope I’ve never roadblocked anyone either, but I’m fairly sure I been roadblocked by social climbers who don’t want me anywhere near their spot on the gravy train or piece of the action – mostly when applying for jobs and DJ / speaking gigs.

http://socialmediarockstar.com Brett Borders

ZuDfunck,

Thanks, glad you liked. Don’t know if it will make sense to a lot of people who don’t experience this, but I run into a fair amount of this in the offline business / social media world.

http://www.yakiji.com/ Jonny T

Great post! This is a frustrating reality of the conference scene and it doesn’t seem to be getting any better…and it’s only on track to getting worse. The irony is that this would have made for a great topic for a panel at SXSW (if it isn’t already).

http://socialmediarockstar.com Brett Borders

Jonny,

I think it’s a frustrating reality of any kind of business situation where people are trying to “get something.” People paid $2k to go to that conference, and they want to make valuable connections – so it’s understandable… but when this kind of consciousness creeps into the group dynamic, things get pretty superficial pretty fast. What can be done? It’s social / human nature.

http://glennhilton.com Glenn Hilton

Reading that just makes me tired. These people need a good cuff up the side of the head or maybe a trip to somewhere like India to observe the sad results of the cast system there and the HORRIBLE impact it’s had on people for centuries. Been to too many conferences and seen this sad plight. You’re bang on with this one Brett.

http://www.ospreyvision.com/blog Steve Finikiotis

Very insightful post.

http://socialmediarockstar.com Brett Borders

Glenn,

I accept that people wanting to climb up and raise their status is part of human nature, and it’s (arguably) a positive drive – although it can be annoying. In India, it is extremely difficult to change your caste by climbing with higher social class members. What you’re born into is relatively fixed.

But I get really turned off when people get so obsessed with climbing that they try and sataboge and block others. From what I have seen, this kind of negative or back-stabbing behavior is not uncommon.

http://www.superiorpromos.com/ Promotional Products

Very compelling stuff here, thanks for sharing. I had no idea about this idea, thanks for educating me on the subject.

[...] more followers, more time in the limelight, more accolades. They are relentless, inexhaustible social climbers who sometimes excel at sales, business development and executive roles. Many high-level narcissists [...]

[...] more followers, more time in the limelight, more accolades. They are relentless, inexhaustible social climbers who sometimes excel at sales, business development and executive roles. Many high-level narcissists [...]

Purple & Chrome

nice article on social climbing! I have a problem with the whole concept of social climbing and how some people feel the need to look down on others to illustrate how much better they are (as if). but i like how this article broke it down.

I definitely know what you mean, as a high schooler I see this every day. Ive even had a few so called friends “road block” me to fit in with their more popular friends.

http://socialmediarockstar.com Brett Borders

sorry to hear this!

Cristina

I have a friend who is a road-blocker, we come from similar backgrounds and even went to the same high school although we met at university (we both study law). She has a boyfriend who comes from a wealthy family, he is a lawyer and a lot of his friends are lawyers and well off too. It’s is very uncomfortable to be around her sometimes because she will tell me that her boyfriend’s brother has broken up with his girlfriend but then she’ll quickly add ‘oh but he’s not looking, the break-up is only temporary’, when I haven’t even said anything, I’ve never actually met her boyfriend’s brother. She never invites me out to social gatherings with her boyfriend and his friends, in fact for the whole year I’ve known her, I’ve only met her boyfriend once. She also constantly talks about the girlfriends of her boyfriend’s friends as hint to say they are not available. It can be very uncomfortable for me.